A Crisis of Coding
by Elven Ink
Summary: **COMPLETE** When Rhys thought about it, the last person who would think Handsome Jack could be replicated, imitated, or perfectly copied was...Handsome Jack himself. Pointing this out to AI Jack leads to something of an existential crisis. One-shot.


_AN: Cross-posting from my Tumblr. Just a silly drabble for a 'what if' scenario at the end of Tales from the Borderlands._

* * *

Rhys was more stunned than afraid to start with. He wasn't sure any amount of time with Jack would make him accustomed to the man's whiplash-changing of emotions. But this rage? This was new for Rhys.

"How about I clamp my hands around your throat and squeeze until your eyes pop and your fricking spine snaps?!" Jack was still digitally-frothing from the mouth, his fury having violently replaced his happiness of mere moments ago. Rhys could count on one hand the number of minutes that had passed since the AI had claimed he wanted to make a robot to hug him on command. Their mutual agreement to run Hyperion together had lasted about as long as Rhys' optimism for their partnership. Then the AI had presented him with a robot skeleton. And a plan to shove it inside of Rhys.

"W-w-we were gonna run this together! How is it together if you're in control of _everything_? Including me!" Rhys protested, scooting back further on the chair to avoid the advancing cables and blades.

"That's the fricking _epitome _of together, idiot!" Jack snapped, leering at Rhys from the monitors all around him. "Me in the cyber-skeleton, cyber-skeleton in your body, that's _together_! Stop being such a wimp! You won't _die_, c'mon!"

"That's not a plus in this situation!" Rhys replied, staggered that Jack couldn't see that. "Why can't we just...y'know...run Hyperion like this?"

"Like what?"

"This! Me, out here, and you in the network! I mean, that's probably better, right? A-a-a CEO in the real world and a CEO in the digital world? Hyperion would be the first company to conquer both!"

This gave the AI pause for thought. His jaw even dropped a little, eyes widening as he considered Rhys' proposal. Rhys didn't dare speak for a moment, letting the unstable AI process the idea.

"...Nah, that's stupid," Jack concluded, scowling at Rhys and leaning forward. "See? That's why we need me in control of your body! That's dumb idea, meatbag!"

"What?! Why is it a dumb idea?!"

"'C-cause it is. We're doing the skeleton plan!"

"We're _not _doing the skeleton plan!"

"We _have _to do the skeleton plan!" Jack ranted, teeth bared.

"No! The skeleton plan is a _stupid plan_! First me, then every corpse you find, all an army of Jacks?! If there's **one **person on the planet who would disagree that there could ever be more than one real Handsome Jack, it would be—"

Rhys paused. Wait. That was it.

This plan made no sense.

Not in the least because it was completely psychotic: that much he could agree could have come from Jack's mind. But a sea of Jack replicas? Sure, the man made body doubles, but Rhys would put money on the idea that part of the reason Jack had done that was to point out that no one could imitate him fully. The body doubles looked and sounded like him, but Jack had never made an effort to get them to act like him. He hadn't wanted to. After all...there was only _**one**_ Handsome Jack. He was far too full of himself to think he could be perfectly imitated or duplicated. This replication idea was the most not-Jack thing the AI had ever said.

His silence was clearly grating on Jack's patience. The AI lifted a hand and began to tap on the inside of the glass monitor with his index finger.

"It would be what? _Helllooooo_? Earth to traitor?"

Rhys blinked, refocused on the room, and looked the AI dead in the eye.

"This isn't _your _plan."

"Errr, yeah, it is!" Jack chuckled, though Rhys could hear a thread of nervousness waver in his tone. It was enough to embolden his next move.

"No, it isn't. The last person on Pandora, in the _universe_, who could think Handsome Jack could be replicated in any accurate way...is Handsome Jack!"

"W-well, yeah dum-dum, I-I'll still be...the original...and the best!"

"How? You'd be copied into every cyber-skeleton! Every copy of your code would think and say the same as you — that **they **were the best Jack. No way you came up with this idea!" Rhys wriggled free of the restraints on the chair, feeling the mechanism come loose at his wrists as AI Jack visibly recoiled.

"I-I did! Shut up!" Jack shouted, his voice crackling over the speakers. "This is how I do it, jerkwad! This is how I come back!"

Rhys straightened up, walking towards the monitor in front of him, face set with defiance even though his heart was hammering in his chest.

"You're already back! You wanted your throne back, and here you are! This? Getting into the real world? This isn't your _plan_, is it? It's your _programming_. You didn't come up with this idea, Nakayama coded it into you! You're nothing but a program, and you're executing a coded command — to clone yourself. It's all Nakayama wanted, to clone Handsome Jack. You're following his command! And Handsome Jack _never _follows commands."

His words struck Jack strongly enough that the AI looked almost _frightened. _In only a second, it had passed and become anger, his face contorting in rage as he growled at Rhys, lip curled.

"Oh no, no no, you're _not _gonna make me doubt myself, pumpkin! Not you, not ever!"

"Yeah? Check it!"

"Wh-wha?"

"Check your code! Handsome Jack was a programmer, right? Nakayama replicated that with you? Check your own code, see if it doesn't have the command for you to find a way to clone yourself!"

"Ah, screw this! You're getting a skeleton replacement, and that's final!"

"Why, 'cause Nakayama told you to do it? Alright...guess you're not very Jack after all..." Rhys shrugged, though he was internally screaming a prayer that Jack would take the bait. Luckily, the AI's pride was easily scalded. The hologram rolled his eyes.

"Fine, you wanna see that Nakayama had nothing to do with this idea? It's not in my code, I'm not just a program, dickhead! Look—"

AI Jack went oddly quiet then, his face relaxing entirely. His eyes became glassy and unfocused, and Rhys was half-tempted to take this opportunity to run while the program scanned itself. But before he could command his fear-frozen legs to move, Jack had returned.

And he looked mortified.

"...That...that was...no, no, I came up with the idea. Me. Right?"

If he hadn't threatened to snap his spine so recently, Rhys might have felt a little sorry for the lost plea in Jack's voice.

"Nakayama was obsessed with cloning you. You were part of that project...I guess Nakayama intended the skeleton to be put in a body double or physical clone of Jack. You're exactly like Jack in every way, and Jack would never take orders from Nakayama. He probably coded the plan into you as a command to make sure you'd cooperate."

"W-well...well fuck him! And fuck you! I don't wanna pilot your stupid meatbag anyway!" Jack shouted back, clawing some sort of victory in his own eyes. "I'm not gonna upload myself to the cyber-skeleton, code or n-nooo- code or n- code or not!"

The image of Jack started to flicker violently on the screen, causing Rhys to step back and Jack to stumble as he came back into view.

"Jack?"

"_Ooooh_...oh hell...I...I do not feel so g- I do not feel so go- I do not feel so good…" Jack said, his voice cutting and replaying like an old scratched record. He had a hand up, holding the side of the monitor as though to steady himself. His other hand came up to hold his head. "I err...wait...what...what are we doing again?"

The image of Jack flickered and glitched over the screens, disappearing entirely from some of the monitors around Rhys.

"Again? Doing again? Doing again? Do not feel so good..."

_I should walk away_, Rhys thought to himself, watching as Jack's code broke apart before his eyes, _I should walk away and let his code crash and error itself to oblivion. _

"Rh-Rhysie? Rh-y-Rh-y-ssss-zzzzz—?"

_God dammit._

"Jack?"

"Th-th-think my c-c-ooo-de is...confli-flicting...f-f-falling apa-apart..."

Even as Jack spoke, Rhys could see fragments of the man's image starting to break away like fractured glass from the last image remaining on the screen closest to him. Jack was slumped in the frame, leaning off to the side. Obeying the clone command would go against his coding to act like Jack... but obeying his coding to act like Jack went against his coding to clone himself as Nakayama wanted.

The program was at odds with itself, and it was tearing him apart. "Haha...hahaa...I didn't do it...d-didn't do what he c-c-coded...c-c-c-command failed...y-you tricked me..."

"I told you the truth, Jack. Just because you don't like it doesn't make it a trick."

"Ha...y-y-y'know...she said...she c-could-she could hear herself dying? Th-th-this AI chick I knew...a-always w-w-w-wondered wondered wondered wondered what she meant. But I-I-I get it now. Now. Get. Get. Now. Hear herself dying?"

Rhys hadn't realised he was lifting a hand up to the cable that hung limply from the side of the monitor. He must be crazy. He _must _be losing his mind.

Jack began to look up, catching sight of Rhys' hand movement. For a moment, both men simply looked at each other, frozen. Then, Jack grinned.

"W-wow."

"Go on. Say it. I'm a dum-dum, right? You're gonna throttle me the first chance you get, right?"

"...Why wo-wo-would you...help me? F-for-for-for Hyperion? You want me to g-g-ive you a-aaaaa-all of Hy-pe-ri-i-i-ion?"

Rhys shook his head.

"No. I don't want anything from you, Jack."

"Th-then...why are you…s-s-sa-sa-saving me?"

"...I'm showing you how to be a hero."

"Oh you-you-you son of a b-"

Rhys screwed his eyes shut and jammed the connector into his temple port. Jack disappeared from the screen, cutting his insult short. Then, he stumbled into view in front of Rhys, tripping over his feet and nearly toppling onto the floor. "-itch!"

The AI regained his balance as Rhys pulled the connector out. The blue hologram was still glitching violently, his edges frayed and lacking definition. Sometimes, Jack glimmered and Rhys could see lines of code furiously whizzing by in the air where the man had been.

"You? _You're _showing _me _how to be a hero?!" Jack snarled. Rhys could already feel the tell-tale headache reblossoming for the AI's rearrival in his head, and pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Yeah! I am! 'Cause heroes don't leave people to die! Even digital people who keep threatening me or replace my entire skeleton!"

Jack's lips twisted into a thoughtful pout.

"...Alright, I'll hand it to you, I _might _owe you an ap-ap...an apooool...apoooloooo," Rhys narrowed his eyes as Jack struggled to get the word 'apology' out of his mouth. He was pretty sure that wasn't down to the faulty coding. Jack eventually gave up, and continued: "I _might _have been a little quick on the skeleton-shoving front. Maybe. But, as you pointed out, I was just running my code!"

"_Jack_."

"Eh, help m-me repair my code before I g-g-glitch into the v-void and you can code yourself an apology c-comma-comma-command in there too, how's that for compromise?"

Rhys rolled his eyes.

"I want a 60 percent share in this Hyperion partnership for saving your life. And permission to code the word 'meatbag' out of your vocabulary."


End file.
